


fever dreams

by spookykingdomstarlight



Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016), Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Fluff, K-2SO makes a terrible nursemaid, M/M, Pre-Rogue One, Sick Cassian Andor, Sickfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-27
Updated: 2017-11-27
Packaged: 2019-01-31 22:03:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,111
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12691074
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spookykingdomstarlight/pseuds/spookykingdomstarlight
Summary: “You’re disgusting,” Cassian replied, not repulsed in the slightest. In fact, had he felt better, he might have laughed. Instead, all he managed was a quirked curl of his mouth and a huff. “I wouldn’t have choked. That’s not how sick people work. Generally.” There probably was a sickness out there that worked in just that way, but Cassian would rather pretend otherwise. “Not in this case anyway.” Cassian considered asking about K-2’s time with the Empire. Did he never see a sick person? Or were the Imperials he knew all perfectly pressedandperfectly immune to such degrading problems as colds and influenza?





	fever dreams

**Author's Note:**

  * For [NotebookishType](https://archiveofourown.org/users/NotebookishType/gifts).



Cassian coughed into his elbow, a hacking sound that he did his best to smother. With K-2 standing next to him, tall and broad and infinitely curious about Cassian, he had all the more reason to hide the fact that he was miserably, awfully sick. Chances were K-2 would give him a hard time if he knew the extent of it, not least of all because they were currently hiding in what could generously be called a motel room if one considered a drafty, dodgy, stinking box approximately big enough for the pair of them—but only just—a room, let alone a place where one would willingly pay to stay.

“I think this is a bad idea, Cassian,” K-2 had said upon seeing the inside of it, prescient to the end. His pessimistic prognostications often came true, but if Cassian halted every mission on K-2’s say so, they’d never go anywhere and the Rebellion would probably wither for the lack of activity.

“What was that?” K-2 said now. Servos whirred away inside of him as he turned his head sharply and adjusted his ocular sensors to better capture the lie Cassian would speak when he said, in response, “Nothing, Kay. It was nothing. Have you never heard a person cough before?”

Flushed—and growing more so by the minute, only partially due to the illness making a mockery of Cassian’s life and work—Cassian busied himself with unpacking his bag. A clean shirt, another pair of pants, several more intimate pieces of clothing, and a toiletry kit later, he’d cleared all the contents save for the various attachments that belonged to the blaster that sat on his hip.

K-2 nodded. “I detect high levels of mold and dust in the vicinity,” he answered. There was a note of pride in his voice, like what he’d told Cassian helped their situation in some way. Though Cassian wanted to laugh at the suggestion, he thought it would only make things worse in the long run. Instead, he breathed in deeply through his nose, slow and even. Or tried to.

Coughing fits were a hell of a thing.

Congestion, even worse.

“Your temperature is raised,” K-2 further pointed out, because he was an awful friend and an even worse droid. Who decided to pay that much attention to Cassian? And K-2 at that, who rarely noticed anything that didn’t involve offering a complaint and a foul word about their chances of surviving their latest trial? “I’m not a med droid, but if I had to hazard a guess, I’d say there’s a seventy-eight percent chance that you are ill.”

Great. So K-2 did realize. “Such small odds,” he muttered, suddenly aching all over. Sighing heavily, he sat on the edge of his no doubt mold-and-dust-caked cot and scraped his hand through the hair on the back of his head. He had the beginnings of a headache, too. “I’m fine, Kay.” Instead of covering the yawn that threatened to escape, he allowed it through, hoping to distract K-2 with the also very real suggestion that he was tired—and not just due to illness, thank you very much. “We’ll be in and out of here in a few days. It’s nothing to worry about.”

K-2’s ocular sensors flickered and he nodded. Cassian didn’t dare believe it was in anything more than acknowledgment that Cassian had spoken, but a man could dream, couldn’t he? “I believe that is often the case with sick organics,” K-2 said finally, dashing all of Cassian’s hopes against the rocks. “Very foolish behavior if I might say so.”

As Cassian bent forward to remove his boots, he rolled his eyes, carefully avoiding allowing K-2 to see him doing it. K-2 was already in fine form; Cassian didn’t need to add fuel to the fire by dismissing him so openly. “You might, of course,” Cassian replied mildly. _But I wish you wouldn’t._ “You could also set about securing the room for us.”

K-2’s head reared back slightly. “What makes you think I haven’t done so already? The room is secure, Cassian. That is the first thing I verified.”

Cassian winced. And this time, he did sigh. Now K-2 was going to get his feathers ruffled over the fact that Cassian didn’t trust him to do his job or—something. Tossing his boots to the end of the bed, the soles striking the hard floor covered in thinning, ragged carpet, he decided there was no point in saying anything more. Groaning, he stretched out along the length of the cot and pillowed his head on his arms.

It would’ve been great—Cassian really was tired and the fact that the cot dug into the soft flesh of his sides and lower back hardly mattered under such circumstances—if he could breathe. Eyes closed, he counted to ten and then wished he could shoo K-2 away while he resettled himself, this time on his side, which didn’t help in the slightest. His hip twinged against whatever it was in the cot that kept poking at him, but he ignored it as manfully as he could.

“You are uncomfortable,” K-2 pointed out despite Cassian’s admittedly rudimentary attempts at deception. “And you have begun to shiver.”

No, he’d been shivering for a while, if truth be told. “It’s nice of you to notice,” Cassian said, gruff. “Look, we have a lot of work to do tomorrow. If you don’t mind…” Cassian sliced his hand lazily through the air, hoping to get his point across both gently and accurately.

“Of course. You want your rest.” K-2 remained blissfully silent for three whole minutes, long enough that Cassian was actually able to fall into a light doze, his mind drifting unpleasantly through the morass of aches and pains he felt. Being sick infuriated him, but at least he wasn’t fully debilitated. Just a flu—and not even a bad one at that. He’d certainly been through worse on missions. That time on rainy, swampy, muddy Fileora came to mind; then, he’d caught a fever and still had to wade around in the muck to find his Imperial target—and then accurately and quickly dispose of him.

That… had not been a particularly fun time.

“Is there anything I can do?” K-2 said finally, startling Cassian back into full awareness.

“What?” he asked, already a little groggy. After the long, arduous journey they’d taken to get here; a couple of days spent in a glorified cargo hold would exhaust anyone. Except K-2 obviously. Eyes gummy and tiredness clinging to him like a shroud, he did his best to wake up. “What do you want?”

“Is. There. Anything. I. Can. Do?” K-2’s driving fingers accentuated his point. Pushing through the air, they punctuated each word. Like the slow, deliberate way he spoke didn’t do enough of that. “Your breathing is labored.”

“I’m fine.” His body betrayed him with another wracking cough. “Thank you.”

K-2 stepped toward the bed and his put-upon sigh told Cassian just what he thought about Cassian’s assertion. “Sit up,” he demanded.

“What are you…?”

“Is your hearing impaired, too?” K-2 cocked his head to the side a bit, like this was a genuine possibility and not just a rhetorical question. He still had a lot to learn about people, and Cassian in particular. A little surprised, Cassian did as he was asked, groaning as he struggled up and then further down the cot. At least he didn’t feel woozy as he shifted. Whatever else might be wrong with him, it couldn’t be that bad if his vision wasn’t swimming.

“Are you going to tell me—”

But K-2 answered his question in action, if not in words. Swinging his leg over the cot, he settled into place where Cassian had been laying. And though he looked awkward as hell in that position, body tilted back, Cassian understood immediately what he intended for Cassian to do. “It won’t be comfortable,” he said with what might have been an apology in his voice. “But you might breathe easier.”

Cassian, very much against his own wishes, found himself touched by the gesture, an unfamiliar sensation fluttering beneath his breastbone. He wasn’t experienced with kindnesses, neither personally nor professionally, on the giving or receiving end. As much as he might sacrifice for the people around him, the ideals he cared for more than his own life, he never equated it with moments such as this. For a moment, he wasn’t sure what to do, whether he should accept K-2’s offer, hating that it might be an imposition to him. And then K-2 wrapped his long, thin, too-strong arm around Cassian’s shoulder and pulled him back into place.

Surprised, Cassian found it was more comfortable than he expected. K-2’s metal body held the tiniest degree of warmth, hummed at a pleasant, low-level that might have been called comforting by someone who wasn’t Cassian. Leaning at the angle he did, K-2 made it so Cassian’s spine could settle easily against his body, most of the poking protrusions well away from Cassian. Stretched this way, upper body a little upright, Cassian could breathe more easily.

“This way you won’t choke on your own mucus,” K-2 said, unhelpful, even if he believed he was being the opposite.

“You’re disgusting,” Cassian replied, not repulsed in the slightest. In fact, had he felt better, he might have laughed. Instead, all he managed was a quirked curl of his mouth and a huff. “I wouldn’t have choked. That’s not how sick people work. Generally.” There probably was a sickness out there that worked in just that way, but Cassian would rather pretend otherwise. “Not in this case anyway.” Cassian considered asking about K-2’s time with the Empire. Did he never see a sick person? Or were the Imperials he knew all perfectly pressed _and_ perfectly immune to such degrading problems as colds and influenza?

Lucky them, if that was the truth of it. Someone on the Rebel base was always fighting a sniffle or sneezes or something infectious and annoying. Cassian considered it the price of living and fighting and sometimes barely surviving in close quarters.

“How are you feeling?” K-2 asked some time later. As hushed as K-2’s voice was, Cassian almost didn’t hear it. _Maybe his ears were plugged up_. How K-2 could tell that Cassian wasn’t sleeping, Cassian couldn’t say for certain. Probably some creepy droid sensory data that Cassian didn’t particularly want to know about.

“Okay,” Cassian said, more truthful. He did feel a little bit better like this. He might even, at this rate, feel well enough to complete the mission they’d come here to do in the first place. “Better.” In what he would later deny as being anything other than a moment of weakness, he took K-2’s hand and squeezed it lightly, lacing their fingers together in a way he dared not do at any other time. It wasn’t, he admitted, something he didn’t want to do under normal circumstances, but he always refrained, believing it better to avoid such entanglements while the war was still ongoing.

Caring about anyone was already a risky proposition. Caring about a droid even more so. Caring about a former Imperial droid? The inherent complications threatened to stagger Cassian, to leave him flat-footed and lost.

“I’ve seen organics hold hands,” K-2 said, far too observant for his own good. That was an asset in the field; not so much when it came to feelings. “Typically that means—”

“I know what it means,” Cassian snapped, the heat behind it miniscule at best. His heart thrummed, waiting for K-2 to connect some inconvenient dots. One and one equals Cassian having feelings neither one of them should have wanted to confront. “Just—ignore that fact, will you?”

“I could do that.” K-2 didn’t move or sound much different, but Cassian imagined the droid laughing at him somewhere in the back of his cerebroprocessors. “But I would rather not.”

“Of course not. Because why would you give me a break?”

“Exactly.” And though nothing could have changed about K-2’s features, Cassian heard the hint of a smile in his voice. Then, K-2’s fingers jerked slightly, curling more tightly around Cassian’s. Cassian, excellent spy that he was, didn’t need further confirmation that K-2 wasn’t immune—to this at least.

After another pause, companionable and warm, Cassian said, “Thank you,” meaning the words in more ways than just the obvious one.

“You are most welcome,” K-2 answered, none of his usual sarcasm in evidence.

They passed the night that way, Cassian in K-2’s arms, leaning against K-2’s frame.

And when he woke, he felt better than he had in days.


End file.
